Following this post from last month, the Chronicle’s Richard Justice continues to lead the cheerleading (see also here) for the Houston Texans:

Times have changed. The Texans have this city’s best owner in Bob McNair. They have competent people in charge, especially GM Rick Smith. They’ve got a core of talented under players around which to build, and for the first time, they’ve got veteran leadership. The Texans seem headed for respectability in Gary Kubiak’s second year on the job.

Interestingly, Justice’s effusive praise of the Kubiak-Smith regime sounds remarkably similar to the following September 12, 2004 article ($) extolling the talents of the now disgraced Charlie Casserly and Dom Capers:

The Texans have made good use of their honeymoon. They’ve drafted wisely and spent shrewdly on free agents. They’ve assembled a front office admired around the NFL. Their players seem to be quality people. [. . .]
The danger for them is that their greatest strength could become their greatest weakness. They’ve done so many things right and have built such a model operation that it’s impossible not to put expectations on a fast track. [. . .]
So far, it’s impossible not to be impressed with what the Texans have done. They are run as efficiently as any sports franchise I’ve ever been around.
Just before the start of training camp, Casserly gathered his employees and thanked them for all their hard work. Then he went down the list of different departments and explained some little thing each had done that made the team – and the organization – better.
That’s the kind of thing the people who run sports franchises almost never do, and it left every person who was mentioned proud to be associated with the Texans.[. . .]
Capers believes it’s vital to emphasize doing things right because “if you ever slip, you can never get it back.”
So far, the Texans haven’t slipped in any significant way.

That sunny appraisal of the Casserly-Capers regime was immediately before Year Threee, and Justice held on to that view well into the disastrous 2-14 Year Four when most reasonably well-informed folks had concluded that the direction of the franchise needed to change. Of course, Justice eventually embraced a disparaging view of Casserly and Capers as if he had doubts about the two from the beginning.
Justice may be right about the current direction of the franchise under Kubiak and Smith, but it’s worth noting that the chronic left offensive tackle problem has not been resolved, the pass rush remains unproven, no receiver has emerged to force teams to back off double teaming Andre Johnson, the running back position has no gamebreaker and a porous defensive secondary has not been upgraded. A little more objectivity from Justice about the Texans’ situation may allow his analysis of the team to age a bit better.